Flesh – Carnal Nature – Selfishness

What is Making Prayer Dead – David Brainerd

The idea that everything would happen exactly as it does regardless of whether we pray or not is a specter that haunts the minds of many who sincerely profess belief in God. It makes prayer psychologically impossible, replacing it with dead ritual at best

– David Brainerd –

Live at his Ease – Andrew Fuller

It is worthy of special notice, that when our Lord had warned his followers to take heed and beware of covetousness,(Luke 12:13-21) the example which he gives of this sin, is not of one that was a plunderer of other men’s property, an unfair dealer, or an oppressor of the poor; but of a certain rich man whose ground brought forth plentifully; and whose only object appeared to be, first to acquire a handsome fortune, and then to retire from business and live at his ease.

– Andrew Fuller –

from The Backslider: His Nature, Symptoms, and Recovery

Love God, Not the World – Thomas a Kempis

Call often to mind that proverb, “That the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing” (Ecclesiastes 1:8). Endeavor therefore to withdraw thy heart from the love of visible things, and to turn thyself to the invisible. For they that follow their sensuality, do stain their own consciences, and lose the favour of God.

– Thomas a Kempis –
from  The Imitation of Christ

 

Sin Blinds – Andrew Murray

One great power of sin is that it blinds men so that they do not recognize its true character.

– Andrew Murray –

Watch the People God Brings – Oswald Chambers

Watch the kind of people that God brings around you, and you will be humiliated to find that this is His way of reviewing to you the kind of person you have been to Him.

– Oswald Chambers –